


better to stop voluntarily than to be cut off

by singlemalter



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 14:55:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23135635
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/singlemalter/pseuds/singlemalter
Summary: Despite everything, he still cares.
Relationships: Valtteri Bottas/Daniel Ricciardo
Comments: 3
Kudos: 40





	better to stop voluntarily than to be cut off

**Author's Note:**

  * For [babypapaya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/babypapaya/gifts).

Losing someone—if he can even call it that, if he’s even entitled to that kind of romanticism—is much harder than expected.

Rivalry is a weak, meaningless word if he has nobody to share it with. He’s contemplated retirement once or twice over the past couple of years; he’s only human, for fuck’s sake. But Daniel hanging up his race suit feels like betrayal—how dare you surrender before I could beat you fair and square? Where are you going? Am I supposed to grieve?

Testing is bleak, a blur of fast laps, don’t do this, do that instead, race simulations. By the end of it, even the marrow of Valtteri’s bones aches with exhaustion, and he shouldn’t be this tired.

Eventually, Toto asks him what’s going on, his clipped tone a clear message in itself: _get your shit together_.

Valtteri says it’s the warm weather, too different from his ideal winter. 

It helps to pretend. 

* * *

Monaco is as small as its inhabitants’ social circles.

Despite that, Valtteri can’t hide his surprise at seeing Daniel out in the wild, all floral shirt and hideous Rhude shorts. This club isn’t particularly upscale; it’s as shit as the Côte d’Azur gets, full of snobby locals and teenagers.

It makes perfect sense for Daniel to come here. 

Valtteri watches as he pops the cork on a bottle of champagne with a flourish, laughing as though everything’s _fine_, he’s just another happy foreigner.

Except he isn’t, because he belongs in a car, helmet on, fighting Valtteri for an inch of tarmac, forcing him to be better.

Is it normal to care this much?

(Huge pileup. Red flag. Sourness churning in his stomach. The taste of fear in his throat before he returns to the track and everything fades into the background.)

Has he ever _not_ cared?

Deep down, he harbours some resentment towards Renault. He can’t help blaming them—fucking Cyril with his dumb politics, Jesus—for Daniel’s retirement, despite knowing it’s about something bigger than power units and defective front wings.

It’s about Daniel being impossible to contain, _live_ and _free_ inked into the same bit of tanned skin, and Valtteri (unfortunately) understands. 

He sidles up to the bar faux-casually and bumps into Daniel, feigning shock. “Didn’t expect to see you here,” he lies. 

“Oh, Jesus, me neither,” Daniel says, laughing. He blinks a few times, like he can’t quite believe Valtteri’s presence—or his audacity. “How’s it going?” 

“Having a drink before sleeping, you know how it is.” 

“Yeah.” Daniel shakes his head minutely, a cartoon character dispelling an inconvenient thought. “It’s been a while.”

_Don’t I know it,_ Valtteri thinks. “Yes,” he says. “It’s been… a month?”

“Feels like way longer,” Daniel admits. He puts a hand on Valtteri’s arm, the number three on his pinky barely visible under the flickering lights. “We should catch up.”

* * *

Usually, _catching up_ involves more talking, less aggressive biting.

“Come home with me,” Daniel says, breath hot against Valtteri’s ear.

It’s a statement rather than a question—unintentionally commandeering as always—but Valtteri nods anyway, falls into bed with a man he’s used as a success metric for the past decade and a half. 

* * *

Something blooms in his chest at the sight of Daniel, faint pink marks across his back, hair fanned out across the pillow. 

It’s not love, but something frighteningly close to codependency. 

Beside him, Daniel stirs, turning so Valtteri’s looking at half-lidded eyes instead of messy curls. “Hey,” he murmurs. “You’re here.”

“Why would I be somewhere else?” Valtteri says, and he thinks he can afford to stay a little longer. 

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Poem 12 of the Kalevala, translated by Francis Peabody Magoun, Jr. into English: “Good is song when ended, beautiful a song when short; it is better to stop voluntarily than to be cut off in the middle.” It’s obviously a Valtteri joke but also a metaphor for retirement? Yes?
> 
> There’s a parenthetical bit in which Valtteri thinks about a red flag incident. That’s the 2009 Macau GP, during the start of which Daniel got clipped by like half the grid after crashing. (It wasn’t a big deal.)
> 
> Because these two have a very odd rivalry that only Daniel really acknowledges, and I wanted to write the other side of it, for my dearest Jen. 
> 
> nicorosberg.tumblr.com


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